Birmingham Council meets to talk about budget

The Birmingham City Council, following its regular meeting today, went into a work session on the 2010 operating budget.

The meeting is an attempt to finally agree on a version to present for a vote, said Council President Carole Smitherman. Council members are still in the work session.

The battle between Mayor Larry Langford and the council over the budget continued today after the mayor rejected a last-minute invitation to attend a morning work session on the budget.

The council planned an early morning work session to discussion the fourth incarnation of a proposed budget, but Langford and his staff did not attend.

Langford and the council are divided over Langford's proposed use of $26.4 million that his office said is left over from the last fiscal year. The council disputes the existence of a surplus, and said the city's budget should be $389.4 million, not Langford's $415.8 million.

In a memo sent to the Smitherman today, the mayor said he was "budgeted out."

Mayor Larry Langford

"I don't know what else I or my staff can add to your budget process and, truthfully, I am budgeted out. I understand you want to cut city departments by 17 percent. I am opposed to it, and recently, I gave a very detailed accounting of the impact to basic city services," Langford's memo says. "I gave you a balanced budget; now the council must do what it was elected to do. Give me back a balanced budget, and please stop using city employees and the city's citizens to satisfy campaign platforms of 'safeguarding the city's money.'"

Smitherman said she is tired of the name-calling that has resulted this budget season. The council is being penalized for being responsible, she said.

"I will not rush and make a decision about something this serious, but I think the time has come," she said. "Until we can sit down together and make decisions, it will always happen this way."

Doug Turner, the council's budget consultant, said the city's financial system, the New World System, also shows a $26 million deficit, even though the city's finance director and Langford call it a surplus. That money comes from unfinished projects and the city's savings account, Turner says.

"There are good reasons to tap into your reserves, but say what you are doing," Turner said. "Let's not pretend that there's excess cash from last year."

Langford called the long process a political game during election season.

"This is nothing but a smoke screen and everybody knows it," he said from his office."If I was running for public office and didn't have any strong issue to run on, I guess I'd manufacture one too."